Vacation from hell- part 2

When there’s no more room in hell the dead will ruin your holiday. Well, at least that is what Dead Island: Riptide developers Techland would have us believe in their gore-fueled follow-up to the zombie-fest Dead Island. My Dead Island: Riptide PC review was originally published on the pages of Shanethegame.com the other week. I thought it would be the perfect review to eXtend and reprint here.

Two years ago Techland’s co-op first-person zombie slasher, Dead Island, surprised us all. Coming seemingly out of nowhere the game garnered a sizable amount of praise, in spite of arriving with more than its fair share of bugs.

My first impressions of Dead island: Riptide weren’t good ones; the lack of anti-aliasing and stuttering frame rates made for an appalling introduction to a game that I was actually looking forward to. Then there was the god-awful long loading times, over three minutes on a top-end 32GB i7 PC, with the game installed on a WD Caviar Black hard drive. I expected a lot more.

Riptide is the direct follow-up to Dead Island, offering up some more zombie infestation in otherwise exotic holiday destinations. As with the first game, Riptide is an open-world first-person zombie shooter/puncher/stabber/slicer/kicker and/or whatever else you can get your hands on. There’s also a pinch of RPG skill and stats leveling, as well.

Having escaped the zombie-infested island paradise of Banoi, including the brief excursion to the town of Moresby on the mainland, our four survivors find themselves the prisoners on the very ship that they though would be their salvation. Fascinated as to why they are immune to the zombie outbreak, the scientists on-board the ship drug and test our hapless survivors. Of course, when they awake the ship is – you guessed it – overrun by zombies.

And so it begins again.

The on-ship sequence serves as an intro to the game’s make-shift weapon mechanic as you search for items to fight the zombies with. At the same time your immediate task is to find a way off the ship whilst helping the other crew members to try and save the stricken vessel. Not surprisingly, you fail at both and end up shipwrecked on another tropical island paradise: Palanai.

This time you can play as one of five characters, one more than last time. You can choose from American football player Logan Carter, rapper Sam B, hotel clerk come Chinese spy Xian Mei, Australian bodyguard, Purna or newcomer John Morgan- a former member of the Australian Defence Force.

The game is intended to be played online with four players in co-op, but that rarely happens in practise. If you select the online option, your game is joinable by other players that are at the same point as you in the game. As with the first game, I’ve only actually ever managed to team up with one other player at a time. Whilst the game is fine to play solo, it is is written as if the lot of you are there, with your teammates appearing out of nowhere during cut scenes and interactions; with non-player characters referring to your absent colleagues as if they are standing next to you. It is odd and a bit annoying. The game is crying out for the same sort of co-operative AI buddies found in the Left 4 Dead games.

Whereas Banoi from the first game was an upmarket resort island, Palanai is more your rustic self-catering, camping and back-packers sort of vacation island. It still looks beautiful, serving as a poignant contrast to all the spilled zombie blood and guts. As with Banoi, Palanai isn’t all sunshine; with the weather dynamically changing, sometimes as little too quickly.

As with its predecessor, Dead Island: Riptide is set in an open-world environment. The game’s story is progressed by carrying out a series of quests that take you across the island and beyond. There are also plenty of side missions to stumble upon during your travels. They are all basically fetch quests whereby survivors want to you to collect items for them in exchange for help, items or access to new areas. They are, however, logical written and backed up by a reasonable plot. Traveling from A to B to fulfill requests never seems to get old, perhaps due to the richness of the island environment which has been beautifully realised in the game.

Exploration is encouraged with the provision of usable cars dotted around the island. I wasted a good half-hour just driving around running over zombies; a pretty safe way of collecting XP. It’s easy to get side-tracked and lose yourself in collecting upgrades and “testing” modified weapons on the island’s unsuspecting zombie population.

Wandering about the island exploring also yields its own rewards. Stumbling on a solitary campsite with a few hapless zombies consuming a corpse; it’s easy to imagine the chain of events that turned a few good friends upon each other to create the scene before you. But there’s no time for melancholy as you dispatch the undead and raid their former abode for snacks, salvage and ad-hoc weapons.

As with the first game, zombie killing and completing quests earns XP, which can be used to upgrade abilities from one of three skill trees. Skills are broken down into Fury, Combat and Survival. Fury skills enhance your special rage attacks (which become available when you’ve killed enough zombies to fill your rage meter), Combat skills enhance your weapon attacks and Survival skills grant you ability and stats boosts.  The more you use certain weapon types the more accomplished you get. You can level up in blunt, blade, hand-to-hand and firearms. All these customisations give the game a nice RPG flavour setting apart from your usual shooter.

Whilst the combat remains the same; with swift a kick to push the zombies back followed by an attack with your weapon of choice, there are a couple of new moves. My favourite is the jump attack which allowed me to take out a zombie below me with a one-strike kill. It is a move that can be easily abused by jump-killing a zombie, running away from the shambling horde, back up to higher ground, and jump-killing another; rinse and repeat. The other move is the head stomp which can be used on a downed zombie, making it possible to kill a zombie with just your legs; very useful if your weapons are worn out.

It was easy in the first Dead Island to get overpowered by a horde of zombies, especially when playing solo. I felt that Riptide was a little more balanced, and less of a chore to play in some of the more zombie-intensive areas.  Masochistic gamers that like their games to be punishingly difficult will no doubt disagree with this being an improvement.

Techland have added a few new zombie types to shake thing up a little. All your old favorites return such as the 28 Days Later-style sprinting Infected and the explosive Suiciders. This outing they are joined by the hideous Ogre, which uses the broken ends of its handless arms to stab you. Disgusting. There are also the Drowners, which can be found lurking in the shallow waters of Palanai wait to snatch you from your boat. That’s right, as well as driving around you can also take in the zombie infested rivers of this tropical island paradise by boat. With the aid of a nice boost ability boats can be used to plough down zombies in the same fun way as the cars. There are a few other new zombies, but I’ll leave them for you to discover.

Before all the fun started first I had to contend with tweaking the game in order to get it to run properly. As a died-in-the-wool, long-standing PC gamer, the ritual hacking, tweaking and video driver manipulation is second nature to me. It wasn’t long before I had Riptide running without issue and at a visual fidelity far superior than the developers had ever intended.

Ironically, Dead Island: Riptide runs on Techland’s own Chrome Engine, the same game engine as the last game, so you’d think that they would know how to get the most out of it. I’m a big fan of the Chrome Engine for all the way back to Techland’s Chrome game, which blew me away with it’s incredible rendered natural environments. I’ve found the visuals in other Chrome Engine games, such as Call of Juarez series and Sniper: Ghost Warrior equally stunning. Most, if not all of the problems with Ripetide where exactly the same problems that the first game suffered from.

Whilst 90% of PC gamers could probably tweak the game, what about the rest? You’d think Techland would’ve taken the time to iron out these issues; especially as the user-created solutions for Dead Island‘s problem have been in the public domain for two years, solutions that also work with Riptide (all neatly packaged up in the must-have Riptide Helper). Remember that three minute loading malarkey that I mentioned. Well post-tweak the level loading time was practically instantaneous.

Regardless of the above, I enjoyed Dead Island: Riptide immensely. It is basically the same game as the first (which I also enjoyed), but Techland have given us a few more attacks and some extra zombie types to play with. The island is fun to explore, this time by car and by boat. Still, the need to tweak the game is very, very disappointing; especially as the post-tweaked game looks absolutely stunning.

After a bit of patience and a few tweaks Dead Island: Riptide became of the better games I’ve played recently, much better than some of the triple-A tent-pole games out there at the moment. For the first houtrof the game I was ready to tear it a new one and give it a spiteful review rating. If this was a console review and there was no easy way of fixing the game, that is exactly what I’d have done.

The thing is, tweaking games is part of the PC gaming experience. This is the price we pay for being fortunate enough to play games on the most powerful gaming platform there is. With literally thousands of combinations of PC components to contend with it is nigh impossible for every game to run perfectly on every PC, no matter what the spec. And so we tweak. Be it .ini files or graphics driver settings.

As I mentioned the post-tweak Dead Island: Riptide looks and plays fantastically. And so, my review score of 8.5 represents the tweaked game running via the Riptide Helper on a decent PC gaming rig. The tweaks are not hard to sort out and should be well within the technical expertise of a reasonably experienced PC gamer.  Unlike other reviewers out there I don’t want to put technically competent and experienced PC gamers off from playing what really is a very good game.

Darren Price

8.5/10

Good Kratos!

VicBStard.com  special guest contributor Judalene Cheetham returns with another game review. Jude has traveled all the way back to ancient Greece to bring us the secret origin of the PlayStation’s iconic anti-hero, Kratos.

Enjoy.

God of War: Ascension is a PlayStation 3 exclusive third-person action-adventure game that is brutally fun and takes you into a world of Greek mythology and madness. Being the fourth entry into the hugely popular series, God of War: Ascension has a lot to live up to but does the game ascend Mount Olympus or should it be sent to the depths of the Underworld.

For any one unfamiliar with the God of War series, Ascension is as good a place as any to start. It begins one cut scene into the first game. So all you need to know is you are Kratos, a Spartan super-soldier, who sells his soul to Ares, the God of War. After much deliberation Kratos decides to ditch the son of a bitch. And it is on this premise you set out acquiring trinkets, solving puzzles and last, but sure as hell not least, killing all manner of absurd creatures.

Ascension, like its predecessors, gives us imposing levels and spectacular scenery to accompany them. They are certainly dressed to impress and leave you wanting more. Be it massive mechanical snakes or a multi-handed temple that used to be some poor blood-oath breaking creature. Scurrying about these monstrosities makes you feel that much smaller as they are always of epic proportions.

Although these levels are of such immensity, there is no lack of detail; all of which is masterfully done and is pleasant to admire on your journey throughout the game.  However during  your running around you sometimes end up doing a round trip, coming back to the same place more than once. This made me feel that maybe the world isn’t as big as Sony’s Santa Monica Studios make it out to be. Seeing the same place twice isn’t as exciting the second time around, but at least you get a another chance to enjoy their handy work.

Ascension didn’t really meet my expectations or necessarily compel me to keep playing and, being a God of War game, I’ve come to expect the story to be of equal proportion. The story just doesn’t have the same oomph that the previous games. Kratos doesn’t have that oomph either. He just didn’t come across as that vengeful, ruthless killing machine and blood bathed bad-ass I’ve come to know and love. On its own the story isn’t half bad but I guess Ascension is set before all hell breaks loose so it’s hard to fit anything super exciting into the period the creators picked.

There are some points in the game where, from a storyline perspective, I felt somewhat lost. The game flashes between weeks prior and current events, back and forth it goes. It is disorientating at times.

Music in this game seemed to be kept only for combat and action scenes; this however made me appreciate it more. It gives these scenes a higher degree of intensity. During the exploration part of the game you might hear an eerie wind or the crying of some tormented soul in anguish, which in itself makes the setting tense and keeps you on edge.

The sound effects were also well done; as when running along different surfaces the sound of your foot steps will change, when you jump or go over a big step, your chained blades will clang and jingle, your loudest of battle grunts will have an echo. I found all of these to be believable and appropriate. Even the stone gears and cogs turning make music to my ears. The voice acting was mostly okay but in some instances I feel it lacks conviction.

The combat of these games hasn’t really changed dramatically through the generations. To wield your Blades of Chaos you use somewhat organised button mashing to go swinging your blades about slashing, slicing and dicing. Ascension has a slightly more organised version of this so I guess that’s a marked improvement to earlier installments. Boss battles also remain similar; you beat them up till they bleed enough to give you opportunity to disembowel them using a quick time event. If you fall short the sequence of these is usually never the same so you’ve got to pay attention each time. I only failed this on purpose to test this of course.

As you progress though the game you unlock a few trinkets and elemental auras for your blades; most of which improve your battle experience. The few trinkets you find are also necessary in solving some of the puzzles the game offers. The puzzles are challenging enough without being too complex. The elemental auras weren’t too satisfying to obtain as you quite literally just come across them but using them was more so. Once fully upgraded, they unlock a magic attack of that element, using them is very much enjoyable. You also increase your health and magic bar the same way as every other God of War game. You collect phoenix feathers for magic and gorgon eyes for health from chests in hidden and not so hidden areas.

I should also give a small mention to the multiplayer aspect available in this game. Yes it’s something new. There were some enjoyable moments but no, they did not last long. It’s essentially a semi-systemised button smashing gladiator experience combined with rewards to allow you to more of just that. To me, it’s just not appealing.

God of War: Ascension brings us all the epic-ness we have come to know and love from these titles. It brings a few new aspects to the table, but nothing game changing. If you’re a fan you’re likely to get it any way. If you have never played these games you’re not likely to know any better.  So for the virgins to the series, when you stand looking at it in the game shop, think for a moment. Do you like getting lost in world of Greek mythology?  Do you like brutally kicking butt? Do you like taking on powers and beings supposedly too much for any mortal to conquer and then do finger paintings with their entrails? If it’s a ‘yes’ then these games are for you. It doesn’t matter if you start here or there, it’s essentially all the same experience. I found the other installments just as enjoyable if not more so. Where you begin is entirely up to you.

I give it a 7/10.

Judalene Cheetham loves dressing up freaky geek style at nerdy conventions and when not creating costumes is gaming it up on all manner of consoles ’til the early hours of the morning. This is one addiction she ain’t going to rehab for, that, coffee and Pokémon.

 

 

Time for a short week in review

It’s been almost a year since my move from New Zealand to Australia and honestly say that my feet have hardly touched the ground. It all a blur; a whirlwind of games, events and previews. I’ve never written as much as I’ve done in the past year and things show on signs of abating.

On the review pile at the moment I’ve the DC Comics inspired beat ‘em up Injustice: God Among Us, Namco Bandai’s Star Trek and Techland’s Dead Island: Riptide.

I’ve also a few bits of DLC that I need to talk about at some point, namely The Tyranny of King Washington DLC for Assassin’s Creed 3 and all those lovely bits of DLC for the most excellent Need for Speed: Most Wanted. I also need to drop some words about the Fuse and Grid 2 hands-on previews that I attended last week.

So that’s what I need to do, but what have I been doing?

BooOOoom!

First up there’s Army of Two: The Devil’s Cartel which I reviewed over on the Game Console pages on NZ’s Techday.com, here. Can’t say that I was ever a fan of the series, I tried the demo of the first game way back and found it…well, a bit shit. To be honest I’m surprised the game tagged one sequel, let alone two. At least the devs have have a couple of prior attempts to get the formula right for The Devil’s Cartel and in utilising the Frostbite engine you at least get to shoot up the buildings in a rather spectacular fashion.

It took a while for the little voice in my head to stop repeating “this is shit, this is shit” over and over again, but when it did stop I found myself having some pretty guilty fun shooting Mexicans. I wouldn’t say The Devil’s Cartel brings anything new to the table, quite the opposite really. But it is fun just shooting and blowing things up without having to deal with any moral implications or other sissy stuff like that.

Defiance: A TPS MMO!

I had a lot of fun with Trion Worlds’ Defiance. Being a third-person shooter massively-multiplayer online game, or TPS MMO and on the Xbox 360, the experience was quite the novelty. But whilst the Defiance TV show looks promising, I’m not so sure about the game especially, as it happens, on consoles; console that are right at the end of their life-cycle.

From my previous experience with MMOs, they do require a hefty investment. What is going to happen when the new consoles come out? Will the game get ported over? Will players be able to transfer their characters? Too many questions for me, I’m afraid. Whilst I think anyone that’s never played an MMO before (i.e. console owners) ought to give it a go, I’d say that Defiance is a game best played on a PC for now. Check out my review on shanethegamer.com here.

Last Light: ruined Moscow

The other week I took the train into the big city and had a go on Metro: Last Light. I’d never played the first game, Metro 2033, so I went in blind and left feeling a bit gutted that I’d been missing out. Thankfully Steam came to the rescue I now I’m deep into the subterranean delights of Metro 2033 on PC.

Last Light continues the rather grim post-apocalyptic tale of the first game about the survivors of a nuclear attack living in Moscow’s metro system. The hands-on followed the hero’s capture and subsequent escape from the clutches of a rather nasty Nazi faction that have also made their home in the abandoned metro tunnels. You can read my hands-on preview of Metro: Last Light, again on shanethegamer.com here.

Addictive fun in Trials: Evolution Gold Edition

Grant’s been busy as well, riding his little motorbikes in 2.5D across all those annoying level’s in Ubisoft’s Trials: Evolution Gold Edition on PC. He had a lot of fun with it, as you can find out here. I’ve played the Trials games on Xbox Live and they are some of the most addictive games I’ve played.

Lastly, A couple of my reviews have also been published in the May issue of the digital version of New Zealand’s NetGuide magazine. If you want to check it out for free, go to  http://mynetguide.co.nz, type in the voucher code FREESINGLEISSUE950 and redeem your free digital copy.

Right that’s all for this time. Back to the island of Palanai  for me. Time to resume bashing zombie backpacker’s heads in. That’ll teach ‘em for staying in cheap accommodation.

Review round-up!

I’ve been flat out playing the last knockings of the Q4 games releases and nutting out reviews for the last few weeks, leaving no time to write any sort of missives on this here website.

I held back on my SimCity review for a while, as I didn’t want to give the game a bad review score only for EA to suddenly pull their finger out and sort the bloody thing out. Well I waited, and I waited. You can read the review on Shanethegamer.com here.

Basically the new SimCity works and is fun to play, but it still isn’t up to speed; which is a bit of a worry, as the thing has been out some time now. Makes me wonder exactly what EA are going to do with the game. The imminent release of the 2.0 patch shows promise, but at the moment I’d still prefer to play the decade-old SimCity 4.

SimCity: still a bit broken

EA’s Crysis 3 was, thankfully, a much better experience; the last thing I wanted to do was continue to shit over beloved franchises. To be honest, Crysis 3 is the first game in the series that I’ve actually bothered to finish. My PC shat itself with the first one and I’ve been nibbling at the second one for an eternity. I loved the fantastic-looking overgrown NYC setting. I also really got into the stealthy hunting thing with the bow; which is unusual for me as I’ve not usually a fan of creeping about in games. You can read the review over at Techday.com, here.

Maximum fun!

Activision’s The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, based on the hit TV show, could have been good but unfortunately it wasn’t. Unlike the superb Telltale game based on the comic-book version of The Walking Dead, I found this first-person shooter lacking. Sure there were some scares to be had and I liked the game’s stealth elements, but not even using the TV actors to voice Darryl and Merle could hide that rushed feel of the game. You can check out my full review over at Shanethegamer.com, here.

Fun for a while, but still a bit rubbish

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, on the other hand, is good game, if a little short. The suspiciously early DLC, Siberian Strike, offers up some of the more meaty game-play that was missing in the retail release and really should have been included on the disc. Played on hard (without the wind/distance assists) is an absolute must if the game is to be any sort of challenge. A head-shot from 700m when manually adjusting your aim for wind and bullet-drop is very satisfying, especially when the game treats you to a slo-mo bullet-cam finish! You can read all about it here on shanethegamer.com.

Short but satisfying

Then there was Bioshock Infinite. A stunning game in every way, and one that is destined to be a classic. My only disappointment was just how much better the PC version was compared to the (still fantastic-looking) Xbox 360 version of the game. It was just so sad to see just how far ahead PC graphics are from their console counterparts.  You can read my reviews of the game over at techday.com, here, and at shanethegamer.com, here.

An absolutely amazing gaming experience from star to finish

The other week I had a hands-on with Resident Evil: Revelations, the 3DS game that know had a made-over for PS3, Xbox 360, Wii U and PC. It doesn’t look at all bad and I loved the TV show-style episodic format, complete with a ‘previously on…’. I can’t get enough of that sort of shit. I love it Alan Wake and I love it in Resident Evil: Revelations. You can find out what I had to say about the hands-on at koru-cottage.com, here.

Survival horror remastered in HD

I’m still putting together reviews of EA’s Army of Two: The Devils Cartel, Tiger Woods 14, the gaming half of the Syfy TV network’s trans-media, Defiance,  and the Mortal Kombat inspired DC Comics beat ‘em up, Injustice: Gods Among Us.

Even thought I’ve not quite finished with my reviewing, I did manage to get some time to myself and play a bit of Final Fantasy XIII. I’ve just picked up FF XIII-2 for $15 at JB Hi-Fi and what with Lightening Returns and the Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD release coming up, I thought it time to get up to speed with everyone’s favorite JRPG franchise.

Another not so final fantasy!

My personal experience with the Final Fantasy series is a bit chequred, with Final Fantasy VII still up there as one of the greatest games I’ve ever played; the series, in my opinion going down from there. It’s like director Yoshinori Kitase trapped lightening in a bottle for that particular Final Fantasy outing.

I found Final Fantasy VIII didn’t quite live up to it’s predecessor; the game’s protagonist, Squall Leonhart, lacking the charm of Cloud Strife.  An unfortunate issue with a knock-off PlayStation memory card (which ended up bouncing off my wall), meant I lost hours of saved game-play, and thus the will to finish the game. I missed out on Final Fantasy IX altogether at release, only picking it up from the PSN store recently.

Final Fantasy VII, still one of the greatest games ever made!

Final Fantasy X took the series in a whole new westernised direction which didn’t sit well with me. This first bit of Final Fantasy on a PlayStation 2 was still a good game, but again I found the game’s protagonist unlikeable. I don’t know why the Japanese believe that arrogant bad boy arse-holes are cool, perhaps its the Japanise devs, who in interviews often like to come across as arrogant bad boy arse-holes, mistakenly think that they are cool. I am pretty disappointed that I never finished Final Fantasy X and never even tried Final Fantasy X-2.

Final Fantasy X -the one with the water

I had a dabble with Final Fantasy XI Online. The game intrigued, mainly because of my fascination with MMORGs at the time. I found the graphics shockingly poor and some of the game’s mechanics a bit too complex for a new user. In the end (as I do with most MMOs) I deemed the amount of enjoyment that I was going to get out of the game to be not worth the cost of admission.

Coming in the twilight of the PlayStation 2 years, I completely missed Final Fantasy XII. Hopefully they’ll HD that game next. Even though I’ll always hold a candle for Final Fantasy VII, there aren’t many game franchises out there that guarantee the the level of entertainment and longevity that the Final Fantasy games deliver every time. May the fantasy never, truly, be final.

As I mentioned before I’m playing Defiance; a first-person shooter massively multiplayer online game from the guys that made Rift.

No just another MMO?

I like a dalliance with an MMO every once (like FFX, above) in a while, but they do always tend to feel like a complete and utter waste of time, and too much like work. Developers would never get away with the grinding nature of MMO game-play in a single-player game. Every single MMO that I’ve played has given me violent flashbacks to my days hitting rats, bats and snakes just outside Freeport in the original Everquest.

Trion’s Defiance is no different.

The TV Show of the game…or the other way around?

The game walks the fine line between enjoyable and repetitive production-line style monotony, like a master of the genre. The game hooked me right in chasing the proverbial dragon with tantalising plot reveals and the promise of loot. However, as someone in their forties, whose path through real-life pretty much consists of tantalising plot reveals and the promise of loot, it’s going to take more than a post-apocalyptic sci-fi setting to set Defiance apart from all those other MMOs out there (including Sony’s ever-so-more polished FPS MMO Planetside 2).

Maybe The Syfy Network’s tie-in TV show will give Defiance the edge it needs over the competition; but not in New Zealand…because they aren’t showing it over there.

Vic out.

Blake’s 7 Returns!

I’ve just been forwarded this interesting press release from my brother  relating to a remake of that other 1970s BBC sci-fi show Blake’s 7.

Whilst a Blake’s 7 remake has been mooted for some time, the fact that it is now being marketed to buyers and with director Martin Campbell named at the helm suggests that it is actually moving forward.

The original series which ran from 1978-1981 followed a group of escaped convicts on the run from the Federation. As with Doctor Who, the show was made on a shoestring budget by today’s standards. I recommend that anyone seeking a bit of nostalgia looks elsewhere, as the original TV show really shows it’s age and is best left as a memory.

It seems as if the remake is, thankfully, exactly that; going down the Battlestar Galactica re-imagining route rather than a continuation like Doctor Who. That being said it would be very difficult to continue the 70s show considering they all die in the last episode.

Check out the press release:

FremantleMedia International Launches Georgeville TV’s Remake of Cult Series Blake’s 7 To MIPTV Buyers

MIPTV, Cannes, 8 April 2013 – FremantleMedia International today launches the eagerly anticipated remake of the cult drama Blake’s 7 to international buyers at MIPTV. In development with US cable network Syfy, the 13 x 1 hour series will be produced by Georgeville TV, the independent studio co-founded by Leon Clarance of Motion Picture Capital, the financing arm of Reliance Entertainment, and producer Marc Rosen. The science fiction classic will be written by Joe Pokaski (Heroes, CSI) and directed by Martin Campbell (Casino Royale, GoldenEye).

The year is 2136, Blake wakes up on one side of the bed.  He reaches for the other side. There’s nobody there. As reality sets in, this handsome ex-soldier sits up, and looks at a photo of his wife Rachel. Beautiful. Deceased.

A revolutionary reinvention of the long-running BBC series made in the late 1970s, Blake’s 7 tells the story of seven criminals – 6 guilty and 1 innocent – on their way to life on a prison colony in space, who together wrestle freedom from imprisonment. They acquire an alien ship which gives them a second chance at life and become the most unlikely heroes of their time.

David Ellender, CEO FremantleMedia International and Kids & Family Entertainment said, “Blake’s 7 was such a forward-thinking concept that the show continues to have resonance with audiences today. Its complex characters and gritty storylines, coupled with the highly talented team and modern production techniques are sure to appeal to both original fans of the show and new viewers.”

Leon Clarance, co-founder of Georgeville Television and CEO of Motion Picture Capital, the finance arm of Reliance Entertainment, said, “Joe Pokaski and Martin Campbell have worked tirelessly with the Georgeville TV team to create an amazeballs reboot of this classic space opera which I watched with my father when I was a child.  This reimagined classic for a new generation of science fiction fans will enthrall original and new fans alike.  I couldn’t be happier to have our beloved show handled internationally by the passionate team at FremantleMedia”

Blake’s 7 is one of several premium drama offerings in the FremantleMedia International scripted portfolio which includes Wentworth (10 x 1 hour), a FremantleMedia Australia production set to premiere on Australia’s Foxtel in May this year, and The Making of a Lady, a psychological event thriller produced by Runaway Fridge and which captivated UK audiences when it aired on ITV1 in December 2012.